Pure
by LadyLuly
Summary: After his death, Arthur Kipps is sent back in time sixty years. Now, he must prevent the infamous tragedy and save the lives of countless children, including his own.
1. Back to the Beginning

**Hello and welcome! I've had this story in my head for quite a while, and now I'm finally writing it down while I should be doing my homework, so I have it fairly well plotted out. I know it's kind of a weird idea, but I just really wanted to share my feels with the entire Internet. Anyway, if you're reading this, it would mean the world if you left a review! I do not own The Woman in Black. Enjoy...**

When I opened my eyes, Joseph was gone. I realized I was still on the tracks and flinched, but the train had already passed, somehow missing me while my eyes had been closed. I looked around for my son—perhaps he had scrambled back onto the platform in time and I would turn around to see him safe and sound in the arms of his nanny or Sam Daily.

I turned. No. The station was deserted, except for a woman in a green dress and a driver who was loading the woman's boxes into his buggy and helping her up to her seat. She looked rather well-off and I was surprised that she wasn't taking an automobile instead, before I remembered that Sam owned the only one in the county. Even so, the buggy was built in a style that had been popular sixty or so years ago. Surely this woman could afford a newer one.

But that didn't matter. Where was Joseph? I looked around me, quickly becoming frantic, but there was no sign of him, nor of the nanny or Sam. The station seemed different than the one my son had arrived at only a few minutes ago. The paint on the walls was less chipped and the wooden floors were less corroded from years of being trampled on. The face of the clock suspended over the doorway was closer to white than the yellow I remembered and a patch of the roof that had been boarded up was now simply a hole. That was when I noticed the schedule that was fixed to the wall beside the door. The date was correct down to the day of the week, but the year had moved backward by more than six decades.

I shook my head. It must be a mistake. Or my imagination was playing tricks on me after the disturbing few days I'd had. But no, I had made a point of looking at the schedule before Joseph's train arrived and the year had been correct.

"Sir?" A woman's voice called, and I jumped nearly out of my skin. It was the woman in green from before. She had noticed me and hopped down from the buggy, to the aggravation of her driver, who had been about to flick the reins and take off. "Sir," she persisted, "why are you standing on the train tracks?"

I opened my mouth to answer, but found that I couldn't. I felt dazed, but I managed to clamber back up onto the platform instead of just standing mutely. The woman looked about thirty and had dark brown hair that was pulled back tightly into a roll at the nape of her neck. There was some gentleness in her face, though it was hidden under stern-looking eyebrows. She looked vaguely familiar. Maybe she could help me.

"Are you looking for something?" she asked, taking a few steps toward me.

"I—my son…"

"Yes?"

"I have to find my son."

She frowned and said, "There's no one here but us, I'm afraid. And I should know; I was the last one to get off the train. No one else stayed on until this stop."

A sudden gush of fear made my thoughts run together and all the words broke through at once. "But he was here," I stammered, "I was here with him. Please, you have to help me find him. He saw her, the Woman in Black."

"Who?"

She didn't know what I was saying. She didn't know the story. Maybe… maybe it really was sixty years in the past.

Suddenly, the driver's impatience got the best of him and he called out, "Mrs. Drablow, if we don't leave now, the tide will come in while we're still on the causeway."

"Oh, of course," she said, but then she looked back at me and her eyes widened. "Marius, come help me with him," she exclaimed. "He looks as if he's about to fall over."

Evidently, she was right because the station began to spin around me just as the driver pulled my arm around his shoulders. I only protested faintly as the two of them propped me up inside the buggy.

"Marius will drive you to wherever you're going," Alice Drablow offered.

"No, no, I have to catch the next train back to London."

"The schedule in the station said there wouldn't be another train to London until next week. You'll have to stay in the village somewhere."

"I'll find a room at the Gifford Arms," I decided.

Her forehead creased. "Where is that?" she asked.

"The inn."

"There isn't an inn in Crythin Gifford—not for the past year anyway, since the old one burnt down. Why don't you stay with my husband and me? Our house really is much nicer than the rest of the town."

I shook my head rapidly. Just a few hours ago, I had been only too happy at the thought of never setting foot in Eel Marsh House again. No. I wasn't going back. "There must be somewhere in the village…"

"There is a tavern," Alice admitted, "but there are no rooms for rent there."

"Take me there."

"No, sir, I insist. It's no trouble to me and Morgan and if you like, we can have you on a train to London as soon as one comes through. What is your name?"

I muttered the answer.

"Beg pardon?" she asked.

"Arthur Kipps."

"Well, Mr. Kipps, I don't think you'll find another place around here to stay and we have plenty of room. More than we can afford, to be entirely honest."

I had run out of arguments, so I said nothing.

"The only problem is…" Alice trailed off. "Well, hopefully it won't be an issue," she concluded, after a moment of thought.

It was another hour before we reached the house. Despite Marius's fear of being caught on the causeway when the tide came in, he was forced to rein the horses into a cautious walk when a cloud of mists rolled over the marshland. Cold, fatigue and hunger were all vying for my attention by the time we arrived at the familiar front gates.

Watching the doors open to a luxuriant, well-kept foyer was something of a surprise after the days I had spent here amid covered furniture and mountains of dust. A man was waiting there when we stepped inside and this time, I was quick enough to recognize the man who had stood next to Alice and Nathaniel in the photograph.

"Morgan, this is Arthur Kipps," Alice announced, letting a maid help her peel off her coat. "I found him stranded at the train station. He'll be spending the night."

I was still feeling rather dazed, but I managed a polite nod. Mr. Drablow grasped my hand and said, "It's a pleasure to meet you Mr. Kipps. Those are some strange clothes you're wearing. From London I suppose?"

I looked down. I still had on one of the typical dress suits I might have worn to one of those dreaded conferences with Mr. Bentley back home. The style of the clothes had been a few years past its prime then, but I supposed now it was ahead of its time by sixty years. "Er, yes," I affirmed.

"Well, they're soaked right through," replied Mr. Drablow. He was right. The mists on the causeway had condensed in tiny pearls on the fabric and seeped through almost to the skin. "I'll let you borrow some dry clothes of mine," he offered.

I wordlessly followed the maid to my room where, I was told, a set of dry clothes would be waiting for me. When we reached the door I froze. It was the nursery. Or rather, it would be. For now, it seemed, it was still a spare guest room.

"Is the room not to your liking, sir?" the maid ventured.

"No, it's—it's fine," I muttered and went inside. I braced myself against the room's strange draftiness and the feeling of being glared at from all directions, but neither was there. There were no rusty toys, no red letters on the walls, not even a hook or fixture on the ceiling from which to hang a rope. But none of this made me like the room any better. I slipped into the new clothes as quickly as I could, leaving the dripping ones in a heap on the floor, and went back downstairs.

I found Mr. Drablow in the sitting room, with his wife in the chair beside his, also in fresh clothes. They gestured that I should sit down in one of the available chairs and attempted pleasant chatter for a few minutes. I learned that Alice had been coming home from –Shire, where she had been visiting her mother, who was ailing. Presently, the maid came back in and announced that dinner was ready.

"Thank you, Grace," said Alice, getting up and sweeping toward the dining room, her husband and me in tow. "Is there an extra place setting for Mr. Kipps?"

"Yes, Ma'am," the maid replied.

Alice nodded. "Good, now will you go and fetch my sister? I think she's still sulking in her room. She usually—"

"I'm here already."

The voice of the girl slumped over the table, waiting for us sent a shock through me, because it was normal. It was high and level and nothing worse than impatient, an ordinary young woman's voice. She was only vaguely recognizable as the woman who had appeared to me in the burning house and the nursery window; her basic features were there, but less pallid and hollowed out than I remembered and her eyes were round and a bit sunken, but they lacked the raw hatred that I knew would be there one day. Her loosely tied-back hair was dark brown with a hint of red, not the raven color I had pictured when I couldn't see it beneath her bonnet. Rather than the mourning clothes I had come to expect, she was wearing a light blue dress which she apparently didn't like because she kept tugging on the sleeves. It made her look innocent, a word I had never expected to associate with her.

"Jennet, you startled us," Alice exclaimed. "You usually stay in your room until someone comes to get you. You must be hungry."

"I'm famished, actually," she replied. "I've been waiting here for ages."

"Why didn't you come and talk with us in the sitting room?" Mr. Drablow asked. She ignored him.

"Jennet, kindly sit up like a civilized person. We have a guest after all," Alice said after a moment. Jennet scowled, which made her look more familiar, but straightened up and took her elbows off the table. Her eyes flickered toward me and she nodded briefly in my direction before turning back to her sister. "Who is that?" she asked.

"I'm sure he'll tell you if you ask him."

She looked back at me. "Arthur," I murmured.

"Oh."

Alice frowned at her sister. "Aren't you going to introduce yourself to Mr. Kipps?"

"I doubt he's interested," said Jennet. Alice glanced at me apologetically and her husband frowned at Jennet, but a moment later the food was served and everything else was forgotten. Mr. and Mrs. Drablow continued making polite small talk, asking about my family and my life in London. I answered vaguely and succinctly; I hadn't had time to think of answers that entirely made sense in this time period and I wasn't hoping to invite conversation and stay up chatting late into the night. I couldn't relax around these people, even if they all were still alive. Jennet picked at her food silently. After a while, Alice attempted to rope her into the conversation:

"Jennet, Mr. Kipps was just telling us that he's a solicitor back in London. He's never been to Crythin Gifford before. Isn't that interesting?"

"Then what is he doing here now?"

"Don't pry, dear. If you had come to visit Mother with me, you would have met him sooner, at the train station. You really should have come with, you know, Mother would have loved to see you."

"No. She would not have."

"Of course she would have."

"What makes you say that?"

"Well… Jennet, you've hardly touched your food. I thought you said you were famished."

"Not anymore."

"Oh, fine. I suppose things like that happen when you're carrying a child."

Jennet's plate squeaked as she accidentally pressed her knife against it too hard. She was silent for a moment, casting a furious glance at me, then she pushed her chair back and left the room.

"It would seem she doesn't want anybody to know about the baby just yet," said Mr. Drablow, confirming what I had already been speculating.

"Thank you, Morgan," Alice snapped, apparently miffed that he had stated the obvious. "I don't know who she thinks she's fooling," she went on, more calmly. "The rumors have already circulated the entire village as well as the one around our childhood home. And, of course, I've already written to Mother. Perhaps I shouldn't have said anything. But as Mr. Kipps is staying with us, he should know."

If I hadn't been familiar with the history—well, the _future_ of this family, I wouldn't have thought it remotely important that they tell me Jennet was with child. In fact I was surprised they hadn't tried to cover it up, seeing as her body wasn't showing signs yet and I was only staying until I could catch the next train to London. My curiosity was relieved when Mr. Drablow said, "You tell him about your sister then," and Alice sighed, and explained:

"My sister is a good girl, Mr. Kipps. But she isn't always… She's not quite right. Of course, it isn't as if she's dangerous or anything like that, but she tended to have—fits, shall we say, when the two of us were young. She only just came to stay with us a week ago because her—her _gentleman friend_ wanted no part of the whole mess, apparently. Just do try not to upset her. Her health isn't at its best and, of course, none of us wants to endanger the child."

I nodded, but later that night, lying awake in a room that I would never, ever be able to sleep in, I thought that Jennet had seemed… fine. Just annoyed. And certainly not like a person who would make children poison themselves or burn their own houses down. Or stand in front of a train.

With a sigh, I turned over in bed. Perhaps if I didn't face the room, I could pretend I was somewhere else. The fact was I didn't know what I would do once I got back to London. Get a job and find a place to stay, I supposed. But I didn't want to stay here. By rights, I should have died when that train hit me, not been sent back to this strange place, and if I was dead I would be with Joseph. And Stella. The two of them were all that was important to me anymore.

An idea struck me. Despite what Alice had said, for now, Jennet seemed to be nothing more than an angry little girl and I thought that maybe she was still together, her sanity still mostly intact. If I could prevent the tragedy that would push her over the edge, the events that led to Joseph's death would never happen. It would be too late for my wife, but not for my son.

Yes, I would stay. Because living in this horrible village for seven more years would be a million times better than living the rest of my life knowing that I could have saved him.

**Eh, see what I did there? Yeah... Please alert me to any grammar issues, typos, historical inaccuracies etc. and they will be squashed. And once again, please review!**


	2. Jennet

**Hi, kiddies! Sorry for the long wait. School has kind of been eating my brain, but I was motivated by these lovely things called reviews, so big ole' hugs for BritneyAndHarryPotterForever , GIR lover42, .Paradise, and Anera527! You guys are awesome.**

**This here chapter is from Jennet's point of view. She and Arthur are gonna be switching off from now on. This one's a little on the raw side, but I'm assuming you guys can handle it, since you enjoy ****_The Woman in Black_****. Which I still don't own. Maybe some day...**

* * *

This damned house. I had never been able to sleep here and likely never would. Alice could blame the pregnancy all she liked, but the sound of the marsh lapping over the causeway outside wasn't unrelated either. I hated being trapped here by the tide, even if I had nowhere else to go. It was like being in a cell, and that wasn't a feeling I enjoyed revisiting.

The darkness probably wasn't unrelated either. Eel Marsh House was nearly two miles away from any lighted windows in the village and the starlight was choked off by the mists, more often than not. But I forced that thought aside. What sort of mother would I be if I was still afraid of the dark?

I lied awake, staring at the window—the only source of muddy light in my room—for a minute or two longer, before whatever it was that was keeping me awake got the better of me. I got out of bed, wondering how long it would be until I was too swollen to do even that without difficulty, and stepped out into the hallway. Luckily, the moon was glowing full and strong tonight, so I wouldn't have to rely on my other senses to get where I was going. I did my best to step lightly as I made my way down the stairs and into one of the more rarely used parlors; the house liked to groan and creak, and I knew that if I woke anyone up, they would make me go back to bed. In the parlor was a rocking chair, which was quickly becoming my closest friend in the world. Alice had bought it during her own pregnancy, and when she had lost the baby, the chair was one of the only things she bothered to keep. I had taken to it immediately, although I knew that it wouldn't be of any real use until the child was actually born. Swaying back and forth in the rocking chair made the world seem last daunting. It was there that I thought maybe I _could_ leave Crythin Gifford one day, find a job somewhere and earn enough to raise a child by myself.

Upstairs, a sluggish set of footsteps began to circle the floor of one of the bedrooms. Arthur Kipps had been staying here for three weeks and hadn't yet failed to pace the floor of his room for the better part of every night. The morning after his arrival, he had all but skipped down the stairs to breakfast, all questions about whether there were any solicitors in the village and if he would have any trouble setting up an office there. My sister and her husband had assured him that he wouldn't and admitted that they were not nearly as wealthy as most of the village people would have him believe, therefore if he wanted to rent his room, they would be more than glad to have him as a tenant. He accepted instantly. I was left to wonder why anyone in possession of their senses would stay here when they didn't have to. Despite his enthusiasm that first day, it seemed Mr. Kipps wasn't pleased with the situation either. He left for his office early each morning and returned late. When he was at home, he spent as much time as possible cooped up in his room, which hardly made sense because he quite clearly hated it. He rarely spoke and we almost never saw him eat. Lately, he seemed to warm up to Alice and her husband and one or two of the servants, but he made a point of never speaking to me. Or looking at me. But most respectable gentlemen acted that way toward women who were unmarried and with child. It made no difference to me. At least I wasn't the only one who was miserable.

I sighed, pushing my toes into the cool smoothness of the floor to make the chair rock backward as far as it would go and listening as the rails bumped against the floor. I had fallen asleep to this sound every night as a child. That had been a long time ago.

* * *

I never liked dolls when I was young. They were pretty, and you could braid their hair, but in the end they weren't real, and being surrounded by pretend friends only emphasized the lack of real ones. They were fun to break tough.

The house I grew up in was isolated and we never had visits from family members, due to a falling out between my father and his brother. I tried following the servants around, but my mother didn't like that. I had Alice to talk to, but she was twelve years older and would marry soon and leave us anyway. I often got frustrated with the lack of company. Sometimes I tried to break real people too.

The doctors called it _fits of rage_, Alice and my father just said _misbehavior_, and my mother was too mortified to speak of it at all. She was the only one—everybody else was consumed by excitement whenever I got angry. For my part, once I managed to calm down, I was mostly just bewildered. All children acted out, didn't they? As servant after servant was hired, only to resign a month or two later, I grew annoyed. People were so stupid. Why would anyone be afraid of _me?_ When my father died prematurely, I collected more accusatory glances than pitying ones.

I was fifteen when my mother had finally had enough. Alice argued in my favor, but by then she could only argue by letter, as Morgan Drablow had whisked her away and settled her down in another village some twenty miles off. I missed her enough to stop speaking nearly all together and flatly ignore the wishes and then the orders of my mother. When she had me taken away, I told myself I was glad. Anywhere would be better than here. When I arrived at my next destination, I realized that I could not have been more wrong.

Being one of the only patients to come from privilege, it took me longer than it took the rest of them to grow accustomed to the conditions. Not that anyone ever really did. I only tried to lash out at one of the doctors once—I regained consciousness a few hours later, too sore to stir a limb. They kept me in chains for a year after that. I decided that this was a punishment: if I stopped being angry, my mother would come and take me home. So I suppressed all my rage and hurt feelings that she had let someone else take me away, and I waited.

I waited for her for three years. The fits died away as I aged and grew numb enough to survive three winters of disease and starvation. It was longer than many of the other patients lasted.

It was the beginning of spring when things began to change. We were three to a bed and one of the women I shared with—an elderly thing who had been sent here for speaking out against her husband one too many times—was being treated for a nasty cough. They thought she might live, so a physician had been called in to see her. I pretended to be occupied trying to scrape the rust off a nail protruding from the bedframe as I listened to the proceedings, so that they would think I didn't care. I was afraid that if the doctors discovered I was fond of the old woman, they would make me share a bed with a different patient.

At last the physician turned to one of the doctors and said, "Keep her in bed for a while and see if you can give her some more water. And send for me again if she starts coughing blood."

His voice was clear and strong and so different from the hollow murmurs of the doctors and the screeches and whimpers of the other patients. It startled me, so I turned and looked at him, and even years later, after everything he did to me, I had to force myself not to smile when I remembered seeing his face that first time.

He looked perhaps thirty, with a thin face and yellow hair and eyes the color of tea with no milk. There were no lines on his face and no grey in his hair—he looked calm and too untouched to be in this hell. Before leaving, he noticed me staring and smiled at me. I watched the back of his white coat until he reached the door. It was the first smile I had seen in a long time.

He was called back in the next day to see to a wound in my hand from a rusty nail protruding from the bed frame.

The blood in my face was scalding for the entirety of his visit and I was sure he could feel my hand shaking as he stitched it up. His face was turned downward, but I thought the corners of his mouth were turned upward just slightly. When my hand was put back together, he went to speak with the doctors in a room that patients were never allowed into. It was where the doctors did their paperwork and complained together about working here. It had been years since I had lost the nerve and the motivation to defy the doctors, but I found myself glancing around to see if anyone was watching, before sneaking out of the communal bedroom and pressing my ear against the door through which he had disappeared.

"Thank you for agreeing to come in, Dr. Pierston," one of the doctors was saying. "A check will be sent to your office shortly."

"It was no trouble at all. Have that nail fixed though."

"We will, we will. You noticed no other health problems in the patient?"

"None. Who was that, by the way? She looked very young."

"Jennet Humfrye, one of our more lucid patients. We don't keep a record of their ages, but I wouldn't be surprised if she were just shy of twenty."

"Mm. What is a pretty thing like her doing in a place like this?"

"Her mother had her sent here, three or four years ago. She suffered fits of rage in her childhood, but they've died down. Now she mostly just keeps to herself, lives in her own head."

"I see. Well, be sure to send for me if there are any more problems."

My heart was still fluttering when I heard footsteps approaching the door. I tried to scurry back to the dormitory before it opened, but I wasn't quick enough. None of the doctors were with the physician as he stepped out the door, but I spent a long moment paralyzed with fear that he would tell them. He looked at me quizzically and I stared back with eyes as round as saucers, then he winked and walked away, down the long, white hallway.

I watched him go, stunned, before I remembered that I still shouldn't have been here. I ran back to my bed and wriggled under the flimsy blanket, pressing my face into the mattress. I had forgotten how to stop smiling.

It became a game. Once a week or so, I would mysteriously attain some injury just serious enough to require medical care. For their part, the doctors thought the other patients were picking on me and had me separated. But I wasn't lonely. I was happier than I could ever remember being, puzzling over new ways to hurt myself so that no one would find out and daydreaming about my friend's next visit. _He_ saw through my game from the very beginning, but he kept it our secret. He seemed happier to see me each time he was summoned, always sweeping into my cell, saying, "Well, Miss Jennet, what have you gotten yourself into, this time?" I was always too shy to answer, but he made up for my timidity, telling me all about his life during our appointments. I learned that his name was Oliver Pierston, he was thirty-two, and he had just recently become a physician after breaking off an engagement to a lady who disapproved of the ambition. After a few months, I plucked up the courage to speak to him, limiting myself to whispered one-word phrases at first, but I soon found myself pouring all my stories out to him. I told him about my childhood with my mother and Alice and the death of my father, about how I had been so hopeful when I was first locked up here and how I had eventually faded into despondency. I told him things I would never have told anyone else. I hadn't known it was possible to love another person so much. When he finally bent down and kissed me one day, I felt so light I thought I would dissolve into the air and never be heard from again.

Within a year, he took me away, carrying me off to a little town in the country side where no one knew us. We told everyone that I was his wife. He said that soon, I would be. I would sit for hours on our porch, just feeling the sun on my face while I waited for him to come home, knowing that no one was chasing me. When he returned with stories about the townspeople and occasionally little gifts, I would tug him inside by the hand and kiss every piece of him. I belonged to him in all aspects. And I was glad to be his.

A year passed and we still weren't married. A little worry crept up in my mind, but no, he would be true to his word. I trusted him. I trusted him.

Another year and the fights began. I had let my life with him stay out in the sun and it went sour. The families in the neighboring cottages often heard our shouting and avoided looking at us the next morning. I told myself I was foolish for arguing with him because I knew that he could leave me with nothing or send me back to where I had been before as soon as the idea struck him. But he could be so _stupid! _And my temper had always had a tendency to get the better of me.

The first time Oliver hit me, I cried until I couldn't anymore. Not because it hurt or because I hadn't expected it of him, but because everything had been so beautiful at first. He had been the one pure thing in my life that I had thought was going to make everything else in it better, and instead it had turned into this ugly mess. It was just like when I had allowed myself to hope for the best when I was first locked up in the asylum. A lot of good it had done me. I promised myself I would never be so incompetent again.

When I discovered the pregnancy, I did my best to hide it from him. It worked: he never knew about the baby—when he left me, it was entirely because of me and knowing this sent a thousand different ways to kill myself racing through my head, but I didn't. I couldn't. There was the child, and I would be damned if I was going to give up on this child the same way my mother had given up on me.

Fortunately, I had begun churning out letters to my sister practically the minute Oliver had gotten me out of the asylum. My nerves told me that she and her husband would be reluctant to take in a lunatic who was unmarried and with child, but I knew that Alice was a good woman. She wouldn't turn me away.

I hated Crythin Gifford and Eel Marsh House, I persevered for the sake of my child. It was my last hope for something pure.

* * *

I didn't realize I had dozed off until I was woken up by the sound of footsteps skittering backward and a surprised gasp. I was startled enough to stand up abruptly, but I caught myself before I voiced the multiple oaths that sprang to mind.

"—very sorry, Miss Humfrye, I wasn't expecting to see you there at this hour," Arthur Kipps was saying. "You frightened me a bit."

I restrained myself from raising my eyebrows. It wasn't the first time I had 'startled' him just by turning up. "Mr. Kipps, you really can't stand the sight of me can you?"

He started to stammer some explanation, but I cut him off with a wave of my hand. Alice or her husband must have said something to him about my having been locked up, for him to be so skittish of me. I didn't care what his opinion was, but I still felt rather stung; why didn't they just make the announcement to the entire village while they were at it?

"You couldn't sleep either, I suppose?" I asked, hoping to divert the conversation to a topic less sore.

"No," he admitted. "I thought walking around might help a bit. This house…"

He trailed off, but I found myself nodding. "I hate it too. I can't fathom why they bought it."

"The architecture, perhaps? I wouldn't know. I'm not much for the craft myself. It—It is a very inconvenient location, isn't it?"

"Extremely. God knows what idiot had the idea of building this house here."

"I hadn't thought of that. You're right."

"I keep telling them they would be better off finding a new one, but of course they won't. One day someone is going to drown on that causeway and it will be entirely their fault for not listening to me."

Mr. Kipps didn't respond. He had gone rather pale.

I sighed, cursing myself. Young ladies weren't supposed to have such morbid thoughts. It was saying things like that that had gotten me put away in the first place. I tried changing the subject again: "How do you find Crythin Gifford, Mr. Kipps?"

"It's a fine village." He was a bad liar. My disbelief must have shown because he proceeded to explain, "That is, it isn't such a bad place to live. I suppose. But the weather is rather dreary, and the people rather hostile."

I blinked in surprise. "You don't say. I had the same impression, but one would expect them to be hostile to _me_. It makes less sense if they are to you." Unless he was also carrying an illegitimate child. Not likely.

"I—well, not so much lately. It was worse before…" for a moment, he looked like he was going to offer more of an explanation, but he closed his mouth limply, leaving me somewhat curious.

Some greyish light was beginning to spill over the windowsill. "You had better get back to bed, Mr. Kipps," I advised. "You'll have to be leaving for your office in no more than an hour or two."

He turned to go, but turned back after a pause. "You should get some sleep as well."

"I'll go in a minute," I promised, but after he left I sat back down. There was definitely something strange about Arthur Kipps, something he was hiding, but then again, I had my secrets too. He was tense and awkward, but I decided that he wasn't so bad when he actually spoke, though I still wanted to know why he chose to stay here. He was far too normal for this place.

* * *

**So, I'm just gonna point out that some of the stuff in this chapter would _never_ have happened in this time period. Jennet, a single lady, most likely wouldn't have been allowed to be alone with any man, either as a rich girl or a mental patient, but historical accuracy is the sacrifice I'm making in order for Jennet and Arthur to have bro time. Please tell me what you think!**


	3. Another Mystery

**Hi, kiddies. If anyone wants to know, if I was talking to you guys in person, I would be sheepishly avoiding eye contact because of the crushing guilt of the month-and-then-some it has taken me to update. I apologize. I guess this whole senior year thing hasn't been as easy as I thought it would be. On that note: I think I'm gonna change my once-a-week schedule (which I've been _so_ faithful to, right?) to once a month. At least that way, I'll be able to keep to some semblance of a routine. Anyway, in a couple weeks, the worst of college app season will be over and I will (hopefully) have a smidge more time on my hands for writing.**

**I'm not in love with this chapter, personally, but at least it's written. Just a reminder: it's Arthur's point of view again. I own nothing. Have at it, guys.**

* * *

I opened my eyes. And shut them again.

Although the two months I had spent in Eel Marsh House had seen my nerves loosen their grip on me somewhat, there was always something to remind me where I was or who I was with, as soon as I found myself getting comfortable. Sometimes I would get the feeling, just for a second, that if I looked up from the book I was reading or the office work I had brought home with me, I would see the house as I had first seen it following Alice's death. It was just a flicker of a sensation that I was not alone here, that there was something _alive_ here, where it should have been perfectly still. And of course there was something alive here because the Drablows and Jennet and the entire staff were here as well, but during those moments, my mind was back in the Eel Marsh House that the villagers had warned me not to go near.

The notion always left as quickly as it arrived, and I would look up to find myself in the Eel Marsh House that was pristine and orderly and hadn't yet come to be associated with untimely deaths. Except not this time. I squeezed my eyes shut as tightly as I could and waited for the flicker to pass, but it didn't. I let a minute or two go by, then I opened my eyes again and sighed. The thick coating of dust on the table in front of me and the heavy cloths draped over the rest of the furniture left me in little doubt that I was back in the time period I was accustomed to. I put my head in my hands, thinking that this inexplicable time-jumping really was getting annoying. I let my hands fall back onto the table and noticed something.

It was one of Jennet's letters. I glanced over the scathing words in her frenzied handwriting and wondered how in the world I had managed to doze off after reading them—but maybe that was just it: I had fallen asleep and had a terrible nightmare about a ghost. Followed by a very strange dream about going back in time. It wasn't completely ridiculous—the last thing I remembered was staying up reading in one of the studies, because I knew that I wouldn't be able to sleep and didn't want to go to bed. I must have fallen asleep. In the dream. And woken up a few moments ago in real life. It hardly made any sense, but it still made the most sense of any of the explanations I could think of. And it meant that my son was alive! Feeling my spirits shoot upward, I jumped out of my chair and began to sweep the paperwork into a pile. I would get on the soonest train back to London, finish going through the paperwork there, keep my job with the firm . . . everything would be fine.

My optimism vanished when I heard the floor creak a few rooms over and the feeling of a presence other than my own came rushing back to me. With a shiver, I told myself that it was only Spider, ignoring the lack of the sound of her claws clicking against the boards as the floor continued to groan. I took a ginger step toward the hallway, to see what was making the noise. Or rather, to go find the dog. Because it was only the dog.

I shuddered, remembering what I had seen of the Woman in Black while I was here searching the house for paperwork. All of that had been months ago now (unless everything else really had been a dream), but nevertheless when I commanded myself to keep walking, my feet didn't move. Seeing the vengeful expression on her face or—even worse—the vision of her suicide replayed would be a thousand times worse now that I had seen her rub sleep out of her eyes in the mornings, and knew that she was afraid of spiders.

But the ghost had never made the sound of footsteps, and footsteps were decidedly what I was hearing approach the room I was in. Steeling myself, and with a final press of determination, I stepped out into the hallway—

-And saw not a ghost and not Spider, but a boy of maybe ten or eleven that my memory acknowledged dimly as one of the children from the village. I jumped at the squawk of surprise he gave when he saw me, but as my shock wore down, I felt my face settle into a frown.

"What in the world are you doing here?" I demanded.

I watched him sputter wordlessly for a minute or two before he managed to choke out, "Meant no disrespect, sir, I only—I just—the boys bet me that I couldn't sneak away from my parents and spend the night in the old house, so—I just thought I would—"

"You came here for a _bet?_" I asked, disbelieving that any of the children in Crythin Gifford managed not to take the stories seriously when so many of them had died.

"Well, not exactly, sir, that is, I never spent the night here. I only sneaked away from my parents and slept in the shed and then I came here early this morning to make it look like I had been here all along."

I felt my frown deepen. "Why would your friends have told you to come here?"

He scowled and made a crater in the carpet of dust with the toe of his shoe. "They en't my friends. They don't like me 'cause I'm new in town. They got mad because I said I didn't believe their old stories."

Ah. That explained why he was even remotely willing to come here, but I found myself even more stricken than before. I knew that children were typically very proud, but would all of them have gone to such lengths for the sake of impressing their peers? And then there was the matter of the other children; it made some level of sense that they would shun the new boy, but they had made him do something that was very likely to get him killed. Were they simply naïve and unaware of the magnitude of what they had done, or was their carelessness with each other's lives a byproduct of the uncertainty that any of them would live to adulthood? In the same situation, and had he lived, would my own son have acted the same way?

I spent a bit of time deciding how to phrase my next question, before deciding to just be forward with it: "Have you seen the ghost?"

The boy met my eyes for a moment and poked his chin out toward me.

I shook my head. "What, me? I'm not the ghost."

"'Course you are. _A_ ghost, anyway. I recognize you sir, you're Mr. Kipps. You came to town same time as I did. There're stories about you now: you didn't believe the tales either when they told you, and you went to the house and the ghost drove you mad. Some of them said you even dug up the old lady and her boy to make the hauntings stop, but it didn't work. Next day, Mr. Daily told us you'd leapt in front of a train."

"I didn't—I don't—she wasn't an old lady, she was only thirty."

He looked at me as if I had confirmed my alleged insanity. I shook my head; what were we doing standing around? "Let's get you back to the village," I said decisively, taking hold of the boy's wrist and steering him toward the foyer. He dragged behind me a bit, but didn't protest. To my surprise, he had even begun chattering by the time we were halfway across the causeway.

When we neared the rows of little houses, he pulled up short. "Do you suppose you could just… stand back here sort of mysterious-like? Only I don't want everyone in the village to think I had to be rescued or anything. And they won't be so happy to see you, sir."

There were no mists this morning, and from our spot on the causeway, we could see through to a sector of one of the roads, where a small group of locals had already congregated, beckoning to the boy and peering at me skeptically. A few of them seemed to be debating something and one woman crossed herself. At this distance, I couldn't make out their faces and I was guessing they couldn't make out mine either, but the boy was right: they probably wouldn't be pleased when they did. I nodded for him to go and hung back, watching, as he trotted toward the crowd and was promptly dragged away by the ear by one of the women.

Perhaps if they had seen me, they would think Crythin Gifford had two ghosts now. Perhaps it did. Lately, as soon as I began to think I understood one level of the bizarre or supernatural, I was presented with another. Nothing made any sense anymore—last night, I had fallen asleep in one time period and today, I had woken up in another. I hadn't saved my son, nor had I fixed anything else. I was beginning to wish that train _had_ killed me—assuming it hadn't.

But that sort of thinking wasn't going to help me finish—whatever it was I had to do. I turned and walked back toward the house, trying not to hope too consciously that it would be its younger incarnation again when I got there. I puzzled as I walked.

I became aware of a dull pain in my head. It was probably just because of the absurdity of the situation, but it really wasn't unlike the headaches I'd been having for the past few weeks while living with the Drablows. I thought about the flickers of presence I had felt and those moments where I had been sure that I would turn around to see the furniture draped over with heavy cloths and the floors clotted with dust. According to the boy, two months had passed here, just as they had in the earlier Crythin Gifford, where I had spent them. I clumped together snippets of ideas until I had formulated a theory: Maybe I _was_ haunting Eel Marsh House, in a way, but only when there was someone there to haunt. That is, up until this morning, I had been living in the past, but when there was something alive in the house—_this_ house, not the earlier version—its presence pulled me back to the present. It explained the flickers I had been feeling. So far, I had only been pulled back for a second at a time because until now, there had only been small presences, like cats or birds. But the presence of a human had been enough to bring me all the way back.

It was a strange theory, probably too much so to be deemed a valid explanation. But then again, it seemed nothing could be logically explained anymore.

I briefly wondered if it was the same way for Jennet, but dismissed that idea after only a moment. The Jennet I had been living with didn't know her fate yet, and if I got back I would do everything I could to make sure it stayed that way.

The house was not back to its old pristine state when I reached the end of the causeway. I cautiously crossed the threshold, hoping faintly that the inside would be another story, and wasn't surprised when it wasn't. I sighed, wishing I was anywhere else. After a moment, an idea struck me and I shuffled back to the study in which I had woken up just over an hour ago, to find the mountain of paperwork I had left still spread over the table. I gathered it up as neatly as I could and banded it together in clumps with the cords I had pulled off of it originally. I hadn't sifted through all of it before. If I managed to find myself in the past again, I would finish going through them and hopefully find some information that would help me prevent the catastrophe that had started all of this.

And then I would have to burn the papers, because I really didn't know what I would do if anyone there found them.

I tried to plan out what to say in such an instance, just in case, but found my mind refused to churn out anything even close to useful. Next, I tried to fall asleep, hoping that I would be back in the past when I woke up, but that was just as impossible. Eventually, I grudgingly opened my eyes, but made a point of staring down at the table top. I was not going to see her again now, after all of this.

The tide went in and out while I was there. At some point, it dawned on me that if I was stuck in this time, I might as well find a better place to wait for myself to figure out what to do next. I waited another hour for the marsh to reveal the causeway again, and then set out, deliberately letting my feet drag as I contemplated where I could go. A stretch of thoughtful wandering and a hunch that I shouldn't go into the village in earnest finally propelled me to the doorstep of the Dailys. They weren't likely to be any less shocked (or even horrified, I realized with a cringe) to see me than any of the villagers would have been, but I had reasoned that they _were_ less likely to cross themselves and slam the door in my face.

Which is exactly what the butler who answered the door did. But evidently, he didn't keep quiet about it because some minutes later, the door was opened again by a white-faced Sam.

"God in heaven," he muttered. "Arthur."

I realized that for all my pondering, I had failed to think of anything to say when I got here. I managed a strangled, "Hello, Sam." It seemed egregiously casual, considering that he had watched me die.

"But. . ." he shook his head, lost for words for a moment. "You can't be here. You're dead."

"I know," I replied. "That is, I think I do. To be honest, I don't really know what I'm doing here either. But I'll explain what I can. May I come in?"

He mutely stepped back, allowing me to step inside.

* * *

"This must be some bizarre fever dream," Sam decided, when I had finished telling him everything that had happened since the last time he had seen me, "and I'll wake up tomorrow sick as a dog and raving about the dead being resurrected."

"I thought I was dreaming too, in the beginning. I still haven't fully decided I'm not," I murmured, looking into my cup of tea, which had long since gone cold.

"This is a dream," he repeated, "but I'll still tell you that I think you should be careful. It would seem my conscience still hasn't forgiven me for letting you go is such a terrible way, and I would hate to see any more harm come to even a version of you that only lives in my subconscious."

Surprised by this admission, I downed the lukewarm tea slowly as I thought about how to respond. Sam blamed himself for my death? Partially anyway, by the sound of it. But that was absurd—nothing Sam could have done would have stopped that train, or gotten Joseph and me out of the way in time.

Swallowing hard, I thought of the weeks I had spent devastated into immobility after Stella's death. Even getting out of bed had become an exhausting task under the weight of my grief, and many days I hadn't bothered. Lying there, eyes fixed on a knot in the floorboards, I had asked myself how I had ever been so stupid and naïve as to think she would have survived. My mind blatantly displayed to me all the ways in which her death was my fault: everything from giving her a child in the first place, to letting her eat the wrong thing for breakfast the morning before the birth. Only when our loyal and usually gentle nanny had given me a much-needed verbal slap had I been dragged back into reality by the realization that I had a son to care for. The doctor had consoled me that there was no way I could have foreseen or prevented what had happened, but the guilt had stuck fast. It never entirely left.

Perhaps it was the same sort of irrational guilt that was weighing on Sam. The human mind was such a defensive mechanism—how odd that we never blame ourselves for anything until we are presented with something as inescapable as death. I wondered if Jennet had experienced the same thing. Her letters had indicated that she blamed her sister wholeheartedly for Nathaniel's death, but maybe just a fraction of that blind rage had been directed back at herself.

Of course, there was no need to think of all this because Jennet wasn't going to outlive her son and she wasn't going to be pushed over such an insurmountable edge. She was going to remain as childlike and benignly bad-tempered as she had been when she had complained to me yesterday about her clothes no longer fitting. She would if I could help it, anyway.

I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts, and came back to the present. "None of this is your fault," I muttered, casting a glance at poor Sam, to find him sullen-looking.

He seemed to debate whether he should argue for a minute or so. Finally, he sighed and said, "Just be careful Arthur."

I let the silence hang for a moment. Then: "She seems so . . . harmless. Sometimes I forget who she is. Or rather, what she will be."

"We were all children once."

I went quiet, neither sure of what he meant nor of how to respond. After a while, the companionable silence congealed into awkwardness and I found myself grasping for something to say. "How is Elizabeth?" I asked haltingly.

Sam looked sadder, if possible. "She—she's not well. Your death and your son's were something of a shock. They've taken a bit of a toll on her."

I looked down again, guilt nipping at my conscience, once again lost for words. Sam surprised me by speaking again:

"If you can fix all of this Arthur, then fix it. And Godspeed."

* * *

When I left the Dailys' house the next morning, I stepped outside to to find it rather foggy, although it was comparatively clear for Crythin Gifford. I began the walk back to the village, planning to return to Eel Marsh House to see what else of use I could find, but realized as I approached the village that it looked all too familiar—but not in the way I had expected it to. I stopped in my tracks.

I was back; there was the building that housed my office and there was the skeletal structure that would replace the inn that had burnt down, once the workers finished with it. I even saw one or two of the Drablows' servants bustling from place to place, plowing through their morning errands. I stopped myself from shaking my head to make sure I wasn't just seeing things, because if I was then . . . well, I would just carry on. It was still early morning, and a workday. From my this point on the rim of the village, I could be at my office within five minutes, but it would be better to go back to the house first and don some clothes that hadn't been slept in.

The inhabitants and staff of Eel Marsh House were just finishing up with breakfast when I got back. I was greeted with a polite chorus of "good morning"s, which I sent back to them, hoping I didn't look as disheveled as I felt.

"Where have you been?" Jennet piped up, ignoring the gentle chiding of her sister. She sounded more curious than accusatory.

"Visiting some family in London," I replied, perhaps a bit too quickly. "I hope I didn't alarm any of you. It was rather last minute and it didn't occur to me that you might worry until I was half way to the train station."

Jennet narrowed her eyes, clearly aware or at least suspicious of the lie, but she didn't question me any further. I had a feeling I hadn't fooled Alice or her husband either, but either they knew better how to hide their incredulity than Jennet did, or they were making more of an effort to do so. Within minutes, Mr. Drablow's focus had settled back on the newspaper in front of him, and Alice had drawn her sister into a discussion of how to go about finding a good midwife. I made for the stairs, but sat down with them at their insistence and agreed to eat something before leaving for my office, thinking how brilliant it would be if this family could always remain the way it was now. Presently, Grace, one of the maids, joined us, setting a parcel and an assortment of letters down on the table; the day's post, retrieved from the village.

Thanking the maid, Mr. Drablow began to flip through the letters, setting a few of them aside, presumably to look at more closely later. He lingered on a letter toward the end of the stack, a crease appearing between his eyebrows, before handing it to his wife. It was a short note, and Alice appeared to read it several times over before speaking. "Jennet, I think this one was meant to be for you."

Jennet had been picking at a loose thread in the table cloth. She looked up and reached for the letter, but Alice seemed to change her mind and closed her fingers around the scrap of paper. She glanced at me and I got the feeling she wished I wasn't there. I wasn't sure whether it would be ruder to stay or to leave, since I hadn't been asked to leave outright and a fresh cup of tea had just been set down in front of me. I stayed where I was, hoping for somebody to tell me to go somewhere else.

Alice sighed and turned back to her sister. "It—it's from a minister in a hamlet a few miles from here. He says you asked him for help at some time, maybe a year ago. He doesn't specify . . . he wasn't quite sure of where you were now, so he handed the letter off to someone who he thought might have some idea. It seems to have travelled around quite a bit before it finally got to someone who knew you were here—"

"Alice." Jennet's voice had an edge of impatience to it now. "What is it?"

"He received a notice from Oliver Peirston's sister. He's dead."

The color in Jennet's face receded, but her expression didn't change. She folded her hands and stared at the floor while the rest of us waited for her to ask how or why this had happened. She closed her eyes and for a moment, I thought she might cry, but when she finally replied, her voice was level even though it was only a whisper:

"Good."

A minute later, we heard the door to her room snap shut and no one saw her for the rest of the day. I didn't get much work done that afternoon. As I sat, shut up in my office between appointments with the letters Jennet hadn't yet written spread out before me, trying to think of some way to make everything better, it occurred to me that perhaps all of this was beyond my power to fix.

* * *

**I feel like this chapter is confusing, as well as late, but I wasn't sure how to make it better. But yeah. Arthur is going to sporadically find himself back in the original time period in which the story was set for short lengths of time, before going back. Don't worry, this will have some significance to the story eventually.**

**I think the next chapter will be better and hopefully more timely . . . please review and don't hate me forever.**


	4. Questions and Answers

**Merry Christmas (to anyone who still remembers me enough to be reading this- even though most you guys probably won't see this until tomorrow so my holiday greeting is useless. Still.)!**

**I think I'm going to stop setting deadlines for myself. It just sets everyone up for disappointment. Lets start out with our expectations nice and low this time, shall we, and hope I'll update before the next presidential election? A big ole' thanks to HyperCaz, MiriFlower27, thechosen1, battyderp, GeneMarie85 and my anonymous guest for reviewing. I own nothing.**

**Jenet's POV again.**

* * *

"Good morning!"

Alice's voice was sugared with an inexplicable level of cheerfulness, given that I had flatly refused to come to breakfast this morning. She floated into the chair across from mine (I was in my rocking chair again, cozied into a rarely-used study with a novel and an insistent desire to be left alone) and smiled absurdly until I was bothered into folding over the page I was reading and closing the book. "Good morning, Alice."

"What would you like to do today?"

By way of response, I help up the book, aware that it was probably not the response she had been hoping for, and not caring particularly. But Alice was steadfast in her high spirits. "What's that you're reading?" she chirped, leaning forward a bit for a better look at the cover.

"_Jane Eyre_,"**_(A/N: spoilers! Ye be warned!)_**I replied. "It just arrived the other day. I assume you sent for a copy."

"I did, but I haven't read it yet. Everybody I've spoken to at length about it seemed either enthralled or disgusted. It looks like you've nearly finished it— how do you like it?"

"It's about a governess who falls in love with her employer. And there's a mad wife who defenestrates herself."

"Goodness. Shall I read it when you're done with it?"

"No. I've just told you what happens."

"Ah well. What would you like to do today?"

"You asked that already."

"Why don't we go to the beach?"

I blinked. "The beach? It's far too cold. I'm half freezing, even inside."

"We'll bring some blankets. It can be a picnic." Her smile didn't even flicker. My sister was a kind soul, but when she wanted something there was no putting her off it. I opened my book back up and pretended to continue reading, hoping there was still a chance I could get away with staying in today. I considered telling her I felt ill, but then she would have brought in every doctor she could find to make sure the baby wasn't in danger. She was always so worried for it. And I mostly appreciated her concern—I did. But I was beginning to feel the occasional prickle of annoyance. It was my child. It was my job to be concerned.

"What are you so excited for anyway?" I asked, wincing as my voice came out more snappish than even I thought was entirely necessary.

She gave me a look and I remembered. "Oh, that. Do we have to celebrate?"

"Well, you're not going to ignore it while you live under my roof." With that, she snatched my book and stood up to place it on a shelf at the other end of the room. I glared at her.

"There," she announced, "now you _have_ to get up. We'll go and get some fresh air and have a nice dinner when we come back."

"I'm not wholly opposed to food or even fresh air, to be honest, but I really would rather you let go of this _getting up_ idea." I frowned and added: "It's become rather difficult of late."

"Oh, poor lamb," she said and although I would have leapt on even the slightest hint of sarcasm in her voice, there was none to be found. "I'll help," she offered, holding out her hands. I grasped them and heaved myself out of the chair, making a point of putting more weight on her than I really needed to and giggling when I nearly made her fall over.

"See?" I demanded, more because I hated to let her win than because I was still annoyed. "I'm hopeless. It will take me an hour just to cross the room."

"Nonsense. You're as lithe as ever." Again, she wasn't being sarcastic, but this time it was a blatant lie, albeit a good-natured one. Over the past few months, I had come to resemble a bubble more than anything else. An enormous, angry bubble.

"You and your husband should just go and enjoy yourselves and celebrate my birthday without me," I persisted.

"Out of the question," said Alice. "Go put something warmer on and put your hair up and I'll ask the kitchen staff to prepare us a picnic basket. It shouldn't take them more than—oh, say, half an hour. Then Marius will drive the three of us—you, me and Morgan, that is—to the beach and we will have lunch and go for a walk and it will all be delightful."

"Delightful," I echoed. The word fell rather flat coming from me—I wasn't given to optimism like Alice was. "Are we going to bring Mr. Kipps?"

"It's a Tuesday. He has to work, dear."

"I know that. But still, isn't it rude not to invite him? What with him being the only person within ten miles who doesn't hate us."

It was true; the people in the village had not been fond of the Drablows to begin with. I suppose it was only natural, given that most of their houses could have fit inside my sister's, and the mile or so of swamp land around the house didn't exactly give the impression that they were open to friendly visits whenever someone cared to stop by. They hadn't become any fonder when Mrs. Drablow's allegedly mad, illegitimately pregnant sister had come to live here either.

"I suppose," Alice conceded. "But there's nothing to be done about it now. I'm sure he will understand."

"Isn't he at his office now? I'll walk into the village and get him while you wait for the food, then we'll meet each other at the beach. If you're still set on going, that is."

"Jennet."

"Don't sound so worried—he won't actually join us. As you said just now, he's busy. It will just be an invitation."

"Jennet, I don't know if your going alone is entirely proper. I don't know if your going at all is entirely proper."

"Oh, I'm sure it isn't. But I forsake any semblance of propriety simply by existing at this point." I waved the matter off with a flick of my hand, but in truth felt rather stung. She didn't want me to embarrass the family. I had done enough of that already.

She didn't say anything, so I went and changed into warmer clothes and searched for my cloak until I found it on a chair in the dining room I must have tossed it over the day before. Alice was waiting for me by the door.

"Jennet, please just wait so that you can ride in the buggy with us," she said. "I don't like the idea of you walking over the causeway alone like this. It isn't safe. Think of the baby."

I felt a sensation similar to swallowing something scalding and realized my face had settled into a scowl. I _was_ thinking of the baby. I hadn't stopped thinking about the baby since I had realized there was going to be one. Did she think I was being careless, that I was willing to endanger my child? I turned to argue that _of course_ I had considered the possible dangers and that it was perfectly safe because it was the clearest day we had seen in a long time and I would be careful and the marsh was nearly frozen solid anyway. Instead I said, "Relax, Alice. If I drown in the marsh then I won't be able to humiliate you any longer, will I?"

I glimpsed the hurt on her face before storming out into the frigid open air and immediately felt guilty. It had been the wrong thing to say. She wasn't so very bad, after all, just more protective than she needed to be. And she had only been trying to cheer me up.

It all stemmed back to Pierston, like most of the things wrong with my life seemed to. I didn't know why the news of his death had turned me unusually sulky over the past two weeks—I certainly wasn't mourning him. Whatever happened to him, he had probably deserved it. I hated him. I didn't know why I had ever liked him to begin with. I was glad he was dead.

But no, that wasn't strictly true. Not if I was being honest with myself.

_Jennet, you are entirely too naïve to have existed this long_, I thought to myself as I trudged. It made no sense that I had been so shocked; it wasn't as if his death affected anything. I had known when he left me that my child would grow up without a father. I had known that I would never see his stupid, self-assured, arrogant half smile again or the stupid mole on his right shoulder or the stupid way he hummed to himself while he wrote letters. Little tunes he thought up himself. Not that it mattered. His death was just a fact, really, an unnecessary confirmation of what had already been settled.

But it meant I had to put to rest the silly old daydream, the one where he somehow found me again and begged me to forgive him, saying he loved me, he would always love me, all sweet and gentle like he had been in that first year or so. If there had ever been any justification for that childish fantasy, it was gone now. I had finally been forced to give up on it, and it was best that way because sometimes, in the dream, I forgave him—and false hope would do me no good. Even if I had never really believed it would happen.

Nevertheless, I had been far from agreeable—well, farther than usual—since hearing the news and the change clearly hadn't gone unnoticed because Alice had been verging on sickly sweet ever since. She thought I was sad for him.

At least, I _hoped_ that was the reason because becoming unnaturally cheerful was Alice's (probably unconscious) way of trying to cheer up the people around her, but it was also what she did when she was feeling guilty about something. And I was growing fairly sure that there was something she was hiding—something that had already happened or something that was going to—that she just couldn't bring herself to tell me yet.

Whatever it was that was being kept a secret, I had determined that the best person to ask about it was Arthur Kipps—Alice clearly was not going to tell me on her own and if she wasn't then her husband certainly wasn't. Granted, it was entirely possible that Kipps knew no more than I did, but if it was something very important he probably would have been informed. Now, I finally had the chance to speak with him alone and, with any luck, would get the truth out of him. Which was probably why Alice hadn't wanted me to go see him: she knew that I would be able to find out from him what was going on (although a more logical corner of my mind protested that she was right and I really was breaking countless rules of propriety, which was probably not going to help the matter of the nasty rumors about the family that were already circulating the village).

By the time I reached the office building, I felt half frozen through. Mr. Kipps shared the building with a pharmaceutical practice and when I asked their receptionist where I might find him, I received the expected raised eyebrows, but was dutifully pointed toward the second floor. I climbed a flight of stairs at the back of the building and found myself facing a door that announced _Arthur Kipps: Solicitor_. It was open, so I went in.

He was sitting at a desk in the middle of the dim room, pouring over a stack of documents that seemed to be mostly scratched out by hand in red ink. He hastily shoved them under an even larger stack of papers when he noticed me come in, and then pushed the entire pile to one side so forcefully that half of it tumbled to the floor

_Odd_, I decided, but didn't think of it much. All men were secretive.

"Don't mind that," he said, blushing a bit. "Good morning, Miss Humfrye."

"Good morning, Mr. Kipps," I replied, gingerly lowering myself into the chair opposite him. "I think the people downstairs might be under the impression that I'm in love with you—midmorning visits without a chaperone and all that. Sorry. You can tell them you allow me to come around because you pity my being mad and they'll think you're quite heroic."

I realized this sounded like something I would have said to Alice. When had I become so familiar with Kipps?

He looked as if he wasn't sure whether he ought to laugh. After a moment, he said, "They can think what they like. It's not as if I'm going to lose customers, being the only solicitor in the village."

I smiled, glad he wasn't upset, because I didn't know what I would do if I had to go back and speak to Alice alone. It wasn't entirely my fault, of course, but I supposed I did owe her an apology. Feeling my temporary spurt of good spirits dampen, I twisted my fingers together and looked down at the desk. A little stack of paper had been uncovered when the larger pile had tumbled to the floor. I picked it up and smoothed out a fold in one of the corners. "What's this?"

"Oh that." Mr. Kipps' seemingly perpetual frown deepened. "Just—just a drawing."

I could see that it was a drawing, done by a very young child, by the looks of it. The word 'Friday' was scrawled at the top of the page and underneath were the wobbly portraits of a little boy—most likely the artist himself—holding hands with a woman and a man, slightly shorter, displaying a resolute frown that easily covered half his face. I looked at the drawing of the man and then back up at Kipps. "It's you," I decided.

He looked rather affronted that could tell. "Do I really look like that?" He asked.

I nodded. "It's the frown that gives it away. Who made this for you, a nephew? A godson?" He had a habit of disappearing unexpectedly to visit relatives in London. The little drawing must have been a present from one of their children. I suddenly felt a pang and hoped that a pair of tiny hands would make pictures like this for me some day.

Kipps cleared his throat. "Um. My son made that, actually."

I was silent for a moment, surprised. "I didn't know you had any children. Where is your son now?" My mood darkened further as I pictured a woman and toddler in a dark little house, waiting for him to come home.

He didn't say anything for so long that I began to think he hadn't heard me properly. Finally, he replied, "He died. Shortly before I came to Crythin Gifford."

Damn! I was so stupid. Of course the boy was dead, or else he would have been here, with his father. It was suddenly very difficult to take my eyes off the pattern on the carpet. "I—I'm so sorry, Arthur," I stuttered, blushing as I realized I had used his given name for the first time. "I didn't mean to . . ."

"You couldn't have known."

"I can't imagine losing a child."

"I know you can't."

There was something in his voice that I had never heard there before. Anger? Of course, he couldn't have blamed me for his son's death. But clearly it was a sore topic and I had been absent-minded enough to bring it up.

"Here," I muttered and held the picture out to him, hoping to alleviate some of the tension that had materialized between us. In an upper corner of the paper, there was a picture of a woman half obscured by a clump of clouds, sporting a pair of wings and a yellow halo. This time, I knew better than to ask who it was. I had seen that Kipps wore a wedding ring.

Well, here it was, not even noon and I had already offended the only two people I really liked in the world.

After a time, he sighed and asked, "Was there something you wanted, Miss Humfrye?" To my relief, the resentment in his voice seemed to be gone.

"Oh, right. Alice wanted to go to the beach. Silly. This time of year. But it looks as if we'll go, so I thought I would invite you."

He looked doubtfully at the mountain of paperwork in front of him. "Is there an occasion?"

"Um, yes, actually. It's my birthday."

He looked bemused, so I shrugged my shoulders to make it look as though I didn't care. "How old?" he asked. "If you don't mind my asking."

"Not a day over eighty-five."

He gave a short laugh that was almost convincing. "How old, really?"

"Twenty-three."

"You don't say." He actually smiled. A real smile, and it was surprisingly bright. "Same as me."

"Really? You look older." But of course he did. He son had just died. _Shut _up_, Jennet._

"Well, shall we go then?" he asked.

"Go where? Oh, you mean you're actually coming?" Ha! Alice would be so surprised.

He got up and walked around the desk, holding his arm out to help me up. "Of course," he replied. "Birthdays are special."

There was the faintest hint of his earlier smile in his voice and now that I thought about it, it really wasn't so hard to believe he had been someone's father.

* * *

The beach was freezing, just as I had predicted, but there was a nice, clean salt water smell and I could almost have fallen asleep to the sweeping of the frigid waves against the sand. I burrowed into my pile of blankets, picking at a roll and happily complaining about the weather. Alice, bless her, had brought the book I had been reading earlier. I whiled away a few minutes trying to read while the rest of them chattered, but I found myself, for once, more drawn to the conversation than to the words on the page.

My sister had concealed her surprise at seeing Mr. Kipps deftly enough when the two of us arrived. She had greeted us and half-heartedly chastised me for not dressing warmly enough. Neither of us mentioned our previous argument, but something in the way she spoke to me hinted that her patience with me was thinning.

Still, I had to admit, if only to myself, that I was glad she had made me come here. I would apologize later.

For the moment, all was well.

* * *

**I fudged the ages a bit. I don't think Arthur was twenty-three in the movie because then he would have been nineteen when Joseph was born and I think that was a bit young, even by the standards of that time period. But he was twenty-three in the book, so twenty-three he shall be here. I'm not sure if Jennet was twenty-three either, actually. For some reason (I'm not quite sure why, looking back) I thought she was thirty when she and Nathaniel died and Nathaniel was about seven so Jennet would have been twenty-three when he was born. But I don't know, I really don't.**

**Moral of the story is bad things happen when Luly tries to do simple math. As usual, historical inaccuracies abound, but oh well. Reviews would be nice.**


	5. Mourning

**You know you're not doing well when Chapter Four goes up on Christmas and Chapter Five goes up after Valentines Day. . . ****As usual, most of this has been written for a long time, but it just took a while to squeeze those last couple of pages out of my brain. Some stupid stuff has been going on with my school work (which is my fault, by the way, so this isn't Excuse Making), so the writing has been slow. But that doesn't mean I love you all any less.**

**Rainbow cookies and puppy snuggles for GeneMarie85, c00kieguirl and three fabulous anonymous guests for reviewing. I own nothing. Arthur's POV.**

* * *

I was drawn out of my room by a rather painful thudding sound and the unmistakable crash of breaking china. I had reluctantly decided not to go into the office today, as the house couldn't seem to decide which version of itself it wanted to be—the one in which everyone was alive or the one in which they weren't—and the constant flickering back and forth had resulted in a splitting headache. Stepping out into the hallway, I found a tray rolling lazily to a halt a few feet away and Alice's maid, Grace, kneeling amid the pieces of what had once been a tea pot.

"So sorry, sir," she said miserably. "I was rushing and the hem of my dress caught under my feet."

"You're not hurt are you?"

She shook her head, frantically trying to gather up the china shards with one hand while using the edge of her dress to mop the tea off the carpet with the other.

"Here," I offered, dropping to my knees and plucking a few shards from the floor, "I'll do this and you go get a rag before the stain sets in."

She bleated a few halfhearted protests before carefully transferring her handful of china pieces to me and scurrying off. I fought off a touch of indignation as I gathered up the fragments—the maid would never have allowed me to help if there had been another option, but the entire household had been in a state of disarray for the past few days and we both knew that another servant could not have been spared. I, however, was grounded firmly in the middle class and a servant accepting aid from me was nowhere near as outrageous as a servant accepting aid from a member of the family she served.

A pair of feet, obscured by the hem of a black dress, rounded the corner. "What have you done now, Mr. Kipps?" said Jennet. I didn't need to look up to tell that she was smirking.

"The tea pot fell."

"Why on earth were you carrying a tea pot?" she laughed, coming to stand over me.

"Grace tripped and dropped it. She's gone to fetch a rag."

"So you're helping. How nice. Alice is always saying I should do more to get to know the staff. As it is, I would help, but bending down has proven to be rather disastrous of late."

I looked up and saw her laugh again and couldn't help but smile in return. Even in mourning, she looked so young and so entirely alive that it was difficult to remember how I had first seen her. Not to mention that physically, she was now the polar opposite of the rail thin form she had taken as a ghost.

"Well, I'm glad to see you so cheerful, especially today," I commented, adding another shard to my handful. "A second notice of death in one month cannot have been an easy thing to take in."

When she smiled again, I got the impression it was forced. "It hardly makes any difference to me. I hadn't seen Mother in ages. I'm only in mourning for Alice's sake."

Her cheerfulness suddenly seemed much less contagious. "Surely you feel a bit of remorse," I prompted.

She shrugged and all of a sudden she was her usual, irritable self again. "Mother wouldn't have so much as batted an eyelash if she had outlived me. Why should it be any different the other way around?"

"Jennet. . ." I muttered, suddenly annoyed. I returned my attention to the china on the floor, not wanting to look at her anymore. There were times when she seemed to come from a wholly different world, one where nothing was generally expected, like remorse at the death of one's mother. It was as if she belonged to an entirely different society that consisted only of her and she knew the basics of interacting with the rest of the world, but she hadn't quite mastered it. There was an undeniable gap in either her knowledge of social norms or her adherence to them and there was a part of me—a part I did my best to ignore—that wondered if she would even be able to raise a child on her own.

I reminded myself that she wouldn't necessarily have to. Not alone, at any rate. So far, no mention had been made of the prospect of the Drablows adopting Nathaniel and I was nursing a shred of hope that they would allow Jennet to stay in their home and raise him, with their help but with her ultimately in the role of mother.

With a sigh, I opened my mouth to tell her that I hoped she would not say such things to the other mourners at her mother's burial, but before I could form the words, she cut me off:

"Are you going to lecture me, Mr. Kipps? By all means, please do so. Alice hasn't had the heart since we heard about Mother and it's looking as though I might pass an entire day without somebody telling me all the things wrong with me—unthinkable, of course."

"Hardly, Miss Humfrye," I replied coldly, still frustrated with her.

Her shoulders slumped. "You needn't be like that. I can't help being mad, you know. If I wasn't then Mother would never have sent me away and I would be dutifully inconsolable now."

Sent her away? This was something I had not heard about. I had assumed she had been made to leave her parents' house when they discovered that she was pregnant, but now she was speaking as if her estrangement from her parents had existed long before that. I let the matter drop, deciding to ponder it later as it was hardly something I could properly ask her about. Instead, I stood up and said, "I don't think you're mad," letting the words hang in the air, obviously only the first part of the statement.

"Go on."

"I think you _tell_ yourself you're mad as a means of coping with guilt. You use it to avoid taking responsibility."

I expected anger or, at the very least, indignation and I forced myself to look her stubbornly in the eye while I awaited her response. But she only raised a delicate eyebrow and asked, "And what, pray tell, should I feel guilty for?"

I couldn't bring to respond and after a few moments of silence I realized I wasn't entirely sure what the answer was, at any rate. There was her separation from Pierston, but that hadn't necessarily been her fault—and to say it had been would have put me on the other side of what few social lines I hadn't already crossed. I felt my face redden a bit as I realized that what I had just said to her might have been considered _almost_ acceptable sixty years in the future. But not now and not when her family stood head and shoulders above me in social rank.

"Mr. Kipps, you certainly are a mystery," she murmured presently, lowering her tone to match mine in coldness. "You drop out of the sky one day and decide to make a permanent life for yourself in a village you've never heard of. You disappear for hours or days at random intervals. I can't decide whether you're amiable and introverted or condescending and reserved and I'm not sure that you know either."

"I hope I haven't offended you, Miss Humfrye. Please accept my sincerest apologies if I have."

The stiffness in both of our voices drew the tension tighter. After a pause, she huffed and said, "For God's sake, can't we just put all of this behind us? I'm so tired of always being upset with everyone."

I grinned, in spite of myself. "Are you giving an apology or demanding one?"

"I'm proposing that neither of us apologize and we simply move on."

I almost scoffed at her—to hear her speak as if _I _was the one who couldn't 'simply move on'! Nevertheless, I reasoned, letting bygones be bygones was probably something I should encourage in her, so I held out my hand and said, "That is most reasonable of you."

Jennet smiled as she shook my hand. I got the feeling it wasn't often that she received praise and when she did, she resembled a ten-year-old who had just won her school spelling contest. Just like that, she was back to being a naïve little girl. Before I could be too pleased, however, the house flickered forward and the wallpaper became faded, the floorboards blanketed with dust, and every corner meshed with cobwebs. I put one hand over my eyes and frowned, hoping that this would only last a few seconds. This had been happening all morning—there must have been a cat or a bird in the future house, since it only seemed to flicker when there was something alive there. I wished these spells would at least last long enough for me to find the creature and help it find its way out, but when I opened my eyes again the dust and cobwebs were gone and Jennet was peering at me, looking concerned and thoroughly alive.

"You are not well," she decided. "That's why you're here. Otherwise you would be at your office this time of day."

"It's only a bit of a headache," I said, absently rubbing my temple. "And anyway, this way I can be with you and your family. As a friend. In this, erm, time of need."

She shook her head. She always knew when I was lying, but rarely said anything, which was a blessing because I had absolutely no idea what I would have said, had she confronted me about it. "Let's go sit down, shall we?" she suggested. I nodded and she led the way downstairs and into the dining room. "One of the parlors would be better, of course," she went on, "but I'm not quite sure when we are to leave for the burial and this way, they'll go straight past us on their way out the door. And I think Alice might lose her mind if she had to search for me for more than a minute. Have you seen her lately?"

"I haven't."

"That's hardly surprising. She's hardly spoken to anyone since the news arrived—about Mother, that is. She's been rather beside herself, I'm afraid."

We reached the dining room and I pulled a chair out for her. She looked at it doubtfully and said, "Thank you, but I think I'll stand. Sitting down is more trouble than it's worth when you're enormous." She nodded stoically, but then smiled to let me know that it wasn't something that troubled her immensely. She gestured toward the chair and added, "You go ahead."

As I sat down, she mused, "It's grief, I suppose, that has my sister so unlike herself. I've seen her like this before and if this is anything like the last time, then she'll be better in a few weeks, but I still worry for her."

"It's only natural, I'm sure," I agreed, although I knew well that the death of someone close could keep one grieving for far longer than that. "But, if you'll forgive me for asking, what was it that happened before?"

Before Jennet could answer, a kitchen maid scurried past us, carrying a bucket that looked far too heavy for one person. Jennet gave me a meaningful look and said, "That's a story for another day, Mr. Kipps." And I knew that the answer to my question was not something that her sister would have approved of her talking about. I nodded and noticed something I hadn't before.

"Miss Humfrye, why exactly is there flour on your skirts?"

"What? Oh. Damn. I wish I had seen that earlier. The answer is because I've just failed spectacularly at cooking, which I was attempting because, as you've no doubt noticed, we are horrifically understaffed."

"The household has seemed rather . . . disordered these past few days, but I wasn't aware that any staff had been let go of."

"No, in fact it's always been this way, but you and I never realized because of one simple reason: Alice does everything."

"Oh yes?"

"Yes. She used to help with the food, the laundry, and I don't even know what else. I never knew until she stopped and I asked Grace why everyone suddenly didn't know what to do with themselves. I suppose she didn't want the rest of us to realize they don't have the money for any more help."

"She told me once that she and her family weren't nearly as wealthy as most of the villagers would have me believe."

"And lo and behold, they're not. God knows what we would do if we didn't have a paying tenant."

I knew I was meant to smile at this, but just as she said it, the house flickered forward again and a very different Jennet was standing in front of me. Startled half to death, I placed both hands over my face, wishing that all of this would just stop. This time, I didn't look again until the click of heeled shoes walking away from me had entirely faded out. About a minute later, Jennet—the harmless little girl, Jennet—returned with a glass of water, which she set down on the table in front of me, and a handful of torn clothes.

"Let's hope I'll have more success at mending," she said, carefully lowering herself into the chair beside mine. "Are you quite alright? You look as though you've seen a ghost."

I laughed at that, although it must have sounded half crazed because it only made her look more worried. "Yes, I'm fine," I clarified. "I just. . . my head."

"If you say so," she muttered, and began trying to thread a needle that she had evidently brought along with the pile of clothes. Just as she finally got the thread through the minute eye of the needle, she gasped and dropped both of them, letting the needle role onto the floor. She looked down at her belly, laid her hand on it and said, "Oh, stop your kicking. Your term will be over soon enough."

"You must be excited," I mused when she appeared to have recovered.

She retrieved the needle and began to struggle with threading it again. "Excited and terrified. I know how many things can go wrong."

I decided not to tell her that she really didn't, and instead took the needle from her, threaded it and handed it back.

"I had to develop a lot of skills when I found myself with a newborn and no money and no wife," I explained, in response to her inquiring look.

"It must be very difficult being a solitary parent."

"It's not as terrible as you probably think. You do have a family who is more than willing to help you, after all." Although I hadn't had some of the disadvantages she was faced with—the social isolation that resulted from her son's illegitimacy, for one thing. But I wasn't about to tell her that.

"They are, aren't they?" She agreed, although she didn't look particularly happy about it. "Alice doesn't think I can raise this baby on my own. She doesn't say so, but I know she thinks it. Half the time I'm not sure that I can do it either."

"You don't have to, you know."

"What?"

"Raise the child alone, I mean. There is no shame in accepting help."

"I'm not ashamed. It's not that." She paused, stabbing the needle through the fabric with more force than was quite necessary. When she spoke again, it was slowly, as if with each word, she was deliberating what the next one should be. "It's just that this child, this tiny thing growing inside of me is the only thing that nobody else can love quite as much as I do. That hasn't been given to me out of pity by my sister or anyone else. It's the only thing that's really mine."

And she wanted to be the only thing that was his. Although she didn't speak this conclusion out loud, it existed as palpably to both of us as if it had taken material form and been placed on the table between us.

"What I need is employment" she said. She had now abandoned the mending and was knotting and un-knotting the thread in her fingers. "If I had a reliable income, then I could leave here and find a little house or a room somewhere. Then I could stop being such an embarrassment to my sister and I could raise the child on my own. Unfortunately, my only skill seems to be upsetting people."

"Actually, you'd be surprised. You're educated; women like you are in high demand as governesses and nannies."

She scoffed. "Good Lord, I'm worried about my ability to bring up one child alone, let alone hordes of them. I would probably be a dreadful nanny."

"I know how afraid you are," I found myself saying, after a pause, "but I can promise it will all be worth it when you see your child's face for the first time."

She looked at me steadily for a moment, then her face split into a heartbreaking smile and I got the sudden feeling that I had said exactly the right thing—a feeling I hadn't experienced since I had last seen my own son.

Jennet looked up as Alice stepped into the room with her husband and Grace and a few other servants in tow. "There you are, Jennet," she said. "We're just leaving. Marius has your trunk. Are you all ready?"

"Yes. I haven't finished this though." She looked at the cloak she had been clumsily repairing.

"I'll see to it that it's taken care of," I assured the group at large. Jennet set the cloak down on the table and allowed me to help her stand up.

"Are you sure you cannot join us for the burial service, Mr. Kipps?" Mr. Drablow asked.

"Regretfully, yes," I affirmed. "I fear I've already been away from the office longer than is good for my income."

"Quite understandable," he replied. "We won't be gone more than a few days. If you should need us, send word to us at the Humfrye Estate in –Shire. Although I trust all will be well in out absence."

"I'm sure it will," I agreed, following them into the foyer, where they all donned cloaks and scarves to fend off the cold that awaited them outside.

"You have my sincere condolences," I assured them, for what must have been the hundredth time, as they stepped out the door. Alice gave me a forlorn smile and a little nod and her husband shook my hand. Jennet didn't acknowledge the statement. She must have reasoned that it was not directed toward her, as she had made it quite clear that condolences were not needed as far as she was concerned. She did, however, give me a smile (which really was far too genuine, given the circumstances) over her shoulder before she clambered into the buggy.

When they were gone, I stepped back inside and was taken aback by the quiet. The sounds of footsteps and creaking furniture and floorboards and muffled voices in nearby rooms had been such a constant in the past few months that the lack of them was disconcerting. I was entirely alone in Eel Marsh House.

I smiled - how novel.

* * *

By the next morning, the flickering had all but died out and I had managed to drag myself to my office, despite the splitting headache that was left. As always, it seemed, I spent the day working away at a seemingly endless stack of paperwork, but for once, I found myself relaxed by the normality of it. I was an ordinary man, working as an ordinary solicitor in an ordinary office. Never mind that I would not even be born for a good forty years and that when the family of dead people that I lived with returned, I would have to continue racking my brains for a way to undo the death of my son.

I was even beginning to nod off when a brisk cluster of knocks sounded at my door.

"Come in," I called and the door opened, admitting a man from a nearby village, with whom I had been working out the technicalities of one of his clients selling a house to one of mine.

"I was hoping we could get the contract settled, once and for all," he explained, after we had shaken hands and he had sat down in the chair across from me. "I think there are just a few statements that still need going over."

"Yes, of course," I replied, trying to clear a space on my desk. "Although you've found me rather disorganized, I'm afraid. I wasn't expecting to see anybody today for a good few hours."

"I hope it isn't a bad time. I meant to send word to you ahead of time, but I've been more than a bit disorganized myself, of late. My secretary has just resigned to go off and get married and I'm something of a mess without her, it seems."

"It must be difficult."

"Yes. I've been trying to find a new one, but you would be surprised how few good women there are who can read and write and aren't already employed. Are you feeling quite yourself today, Kipps? You look as if I've just told you the Messiah is returning."

"Yes, yes," I replied. "But I think I can help you. Suppose I know a woman who can read and write and is currently looking for work? She doesn't have much –well, any past experience, but she's eager to work and quite sweet, most of the time." The last part was a lie, really, but I knew that Jennet had the capacity to be pleasant, although she didn't always or even normally choose to be. But she could, and she would if she had to. And she did have to.

"The only drawback," I continued, "is that she can't begin work immediately. She's in a bit of a fix, you see: she's with child and, um, the father is just recently dead, so she has no way of feeding the child unless she finds work herself." Realizing that this was another blatant lie, I added, "She prefers not to accept charity. But she wouldn't be able to start until after the birth."

"Naturally. But how soon would that be?"

"Not more than a month, I think."

The man nodded. "I would have to speak with her, of course. But it's certainly a possibility."

We spent the remainder of the afternoon combing through our contract, but I had difficulty concentrating and found myself wishing that Jennet and her family would return as soon as possible so that I could tell her what had happened. She would be delighted, I was sure of it. Alice could hardly object to Jennet keeping her son if Jennet had the means to provide for him—Alice Drablow wasn't spiteful enough to maintain an argument when fair reasoning was against her.

I whistled, on my way home.


	6. Note

**Hey guys, sadly this is not Chapter 6. I know that it's been a really, really long time since I've posted and I just wanted to let everyone know that this story IS still a work in progress and I have no intention of abandoning it. School is almost over so hopefully I will have more time to write in not-too-long. I will try to have the next chapter up as soon as possible, at which point I'll take this note down. If you're still here, then thanks for sticking with me this long!**

**Humblest apologies  
Luly**


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